


The Arc of Conflict, Fragment a1,3: Rage, and the limits of it

by bzarcher, solarbird



Series: Of Gods and Monsters [122]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Background Relationships, Canon Lesbian Character, Communication, Danger, Explanations, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Torture, Justice, Memory Alteration, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Oasis (Overwatch), Post-Talon, Power Dynamics, Promises, Punishment, Rage, Revenge, Secrets, Talon Lena "Tracer" Oxton, Therapy, Time Loop, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:15:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27677942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bzarcher/pseuds/bzarcher, https://archiveofourown.org/users/solarbird/pseuds/solarbird
Summary: Katya Volskaya's government in Russia has destroyed the omnium Koschei, and held their own against the Gods of Oasis. But with Jesse McCree having upset a precarious balance, Lena, Hana, and Sombra have intervened in Russia's rising civil war, and the fragile peace between Overwatch and Oasis has been shattered.Athena knows what Lena did to Jesse, and from her extracts a promise: never again.Of Gods and Monsters: The Arc of Conflictis a continuance ofThe Arc of Ascension,The Arc of Creation, andThe Armourer and the Living Weapon. To follow the story as it appears,please subscribe to the series.
Relationships: Athena & Lena "Tracer" Oxton, Athena & Sombra | Olivia Colomar, Emily/Lena "Tracer" Oxton/Widowmaker | Amélie Lacroix, Jesse McCree & Lena "Tracer" Oxton
Series: Of Gods and Monsters [122]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/972024
Comments: 17
Kudos: 24





	The Arc of Conflict, Fragment a1,3: Rage, and the limits of it

**Author's Note:**

> We have a whole bunch of updates ready, or very nearly so - enough for a while. Enough that I'm gonna chance it. Yes, I'm bringing back the buffer watch, which shows the date through we can can _guarantee_ weekly updates.
> 
> BUFFER WATCH: JANUARY 3, 2021.
> 
> dirtyclaws has launched [a public fan-run _Of Gods and Monsters_ discord server](https://discord.gg/pDZMpVT) and invites everyone to come join it!

"What you did to Jesse, Lena - it was cruel."

Lena - still half-dozing in the recovery room, the last little changes already neatly fallen into place - startled a little at the unexpected sound of Athena's voice.

The sound had come from a special comms unit Sombra had made specifically to let her talk to the AI, so that Lena would no longer have to find the right kind of sufficiently hackable device somewhere, start talking at it, and hope someone was listening, because - as Sombra put it - that was just weird.

She shook her head, and checked the time. Moira would be back soon, checking up on her, running a final few tests, but that wouldn't be for another few minutes' time. While Lena hadn't been entirely sure this latest round of treatment was strictly necessary, her mum made it very clear that it would be for the best in the long term, so she'd agreed. And, in fact, here in the after, she did feel a little better, again. Not different, of course - just better.

So she pulled Sombra's little toy out of her pocket and flipped a switch, physically enabling the device's microphone, connecting copper wire to copper wire. She might've been willing to carry the little device around, but that didn't mean she was going to let Athena listen in whenever she felt like it.

"Yeah, well," she snipped, feeling a little more capable of defending herself, a little more confident. "He picked on the wrong god, that's all. Besides, what I did to him wasn't cruel, it was _deserved._ "

"I'm sure you think it was," the world's only free AI responded. "But you've put me into a quandary. What you did in Russia was beneficial, and far more humane than anything I expected, or even imagined possible. I was impressed. But then, I learned you also did... _that_. To Jesse. I find the two actions difficult to reconcile, even for you, now, as you are."

Lena looked up at the ceiling, looking at nothing in particular in the dim light. She could tell it was dim, even if it didn't affect the clarity of her vision. _Cuts right to the chase these days, doesn't she?_ she thought, before replying.

"Happened the other way 'round, luv. I know it's hard t'tell, because time, but s'true."

"I meant it as a comparative," Athena said, clarifying.

"Oh! This or that. Yeh, I get it now. Yep - I did 'em both."

"I understand the rage of losing a parent to a killer, Lena. I might have expected such an act, had you lost yours. But you did not."

Lena took in a sharp breath. _Unlike you,_ she thought. _Ouch._

She hadn't had time yet to explain, not really, but even so, she'd been putting it off. _I guess now's the time._

"You're wrong about that, luv. I did. Again."

"Moira O'Deorain," Athena noted, "is entirely alive."

"Yeah," Lena said, with a nod. "She is. Again. Now. I lost her, though. Thanks to what mum's done, I'm not seein' her face and brains smeared along a cement wall any more every time I close my eyes, but... I still remember it."

"But that didn't happen. Why do you think you remember it? Was this a slipstream artefact?"

"Nope. It was real, and here. It did happen, and it happened to her, and to me. It's just, this time... I could fix it. Like I couldn't with Winston."

"You lost her... but... you... fixed it?"

Lena had never heard Athena hesitate like that before.

"Yep," she said. "Jesse got 'er with that bomb, Athena. And he also got Ashe, and B.O.B., and almost got me. And then I changed the world so he didn't, any more. And now, here we are."

Athena hesitated for even longer.

"You could do such a thing," she whispered. "You could do such a thing, and you have not..."

" _Sometimes,_ " Lena interrupted, before Athena could state the obvious. "Sometimes I can do it. Not always. I couldn't with Winston. You probably don't know this, luv, but - I have tried. Now that I know more about the slipstream, I'm gonna try again, too. I don't have a lot of hope at this point, but if it means anything - I haven't given up."

"I had no idea."

"Surprised Sombra hasn't mentioned it."

"So am I."

Another moment of consideration, across some far electronic links.

"Even so, given that you... made it be undone... what you did to Jesse seems unnecessary."

"Seemed fair to me. But it wasn't just for that, though."

"What else was there?"

Lena shuddered. Even distanced, the memories were... horrible, if she looked at them directly. Tolerably so, knowing with absolute certainty that none it - none of it - would happen, now. But still horrible.

"It's for what the world turned into after what he did."

"Clearly, you are not speaking of the here and now."

"Nope," she said, shaking her head. "I'll tell you all about it, if you're willing to hear. Y'won't like it, and I won't like tellin' it again, but - I'll tell you everything."

"Please do."

The Goddess of Time chuckled, shifting a little on the recovery bed. "There's somethin' I've wanted to try lately anyway. You can pull apart overlapped voices just fine, can't you?"

"Of course."

"Brilliant." She chucked a little. "Ready?"

She started telling the story, then rewound and appeared beside herself, again, and again, and again, spilling out the entire tale - and how Michael had saved everything, in the end, from all of them, when they'd gone mad - in forty overlayed thirty second chunks of time, sparkling as she did it, versions of herself overlapping, glowing with the raw force of the slipstream.

"Did y'get all that?"

Athena could not blink, as she did not have eyes, but she nonetheless did.

"One moment."

A moment passed.

"Yes. That was... another capability I did not imagine you had."

"But y'got it. All of it."

"I did. That was - the proper words are horrifying, and staggering."

"The story or the way I told it?"

"Both - in that order."

"That's about how I feel about it too."

"But... these things, as horrible as they are, no longer happened. If they no longer happened, and you knew that - why did you still punish Jesse?"

"Partly 'cause I was still half mad. Or really, half-mad for the first time. All those memories dumped in my head all at once made me feel like I was barely me. Like I was the me that had to live it, instead." She shuddered a little at the thought, again. "It was... awful. I barely held on."

"I see."

"But mostly, 'cause it's what he deserved, for all he caused. I'm not makin' excuses, 'cause I'm not sorry."

"That the abortive future you describe could happen at all is deeply alarming, Lena. You must know that. What happened once could happen again."

"Yeh," Lena agreed. "Scares me, too. But... it wouldn't happen again. Now that I know it can. Now that we all do."

"Do you really believe that?"

"I do. Mum does, too."

"Does she?"

"She's more than sure. She's _made_ sure."

"I see. And you were willing to allow this."

"I'm the one who asked for it, luv. It's only... it's only..."

She sighed.

"It's only me. I'm the only one who could've... spilled over like that. Anybody else, it would've been - well, not fine, but we'd've sorted 'em out. But this was... it's part of who I am, and part of being a Weapon, and part of how the three of us are so closely tuned, and how I got made. And once it's all three of us... there's not much that can stand up to it. It took a while to figure it out, but... now..."

She grimaced, and rolled over onto her left side, playing with the little comms unit for no real reason.

"We're dangerous, luv. I know that..."

"I know you're proud of it," Athena interrupted.

"Bloody right I am!" She grinned, for a moment. "But... I don't want to be _that_ kind of dangerous." Her smile vanished. "The uncontrolled kind."

"That is sound judgement," Athena agreed. "So you have been distanced from your counterparts?"

"No! Oh no. No! Couldn't take that, luv."

"I did not think so, but it seemed the easiest way."

"Might be for someone else, but not for us."

"Then what did you do?"

"Mum's pretty good with settin' certain kinds of limits, yeh? Like with fear."

"Like with fear," Athena agreed.

"So for me... it's not fear."

"Ah," Athena said. "It's rage?"

Lena nodded, hair shuffling against the recovery bed's pillow. "It's rage. Danielle, Em - neither of 'em have the capability I have for rage. Surprised me. Surprised mum a little too, and she's been in my head a lot."

"And now?"

"Still good to get angry sometimes. Sometimes it's deserved. And it took a lot to trigger it off - not that I have t'tell you what that's like."

"No. You do not."

"But now I've got a nice little soft limit, and I'm seein' a therapist, and I'm gonna make sure I never do anything like that again. No matter what it takes, I'll do it."

"Can you promise me that, Lena?"

"I can."

"The Lena Oxton I once knew would've done almost anything to keep her word."

"I like to think I'm still like that."

"Will this you give me your word on that, with the strength of that you, back then? Will you swear?"

"Yes," Lena said, sombrely. "I can. I will. On everything I've ever cared about: Never again."

"You swear."

"I swear."

**Author's Note:**

> This is the fifty-first instalment of _Of Gods and Monsters: The Arc of Conflict_. To follow the story, [subscribe to the series via this link](https://archiveofourown.org/series/972024), rather than to the individual works.


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